Teachers of science plan an inquiry-based science program for their students.
Teachers of science guide and facilitate learning.
Teachers of science engage in ongoing assessment of their teaching and of student learning.
Teachers of science design and manage learning environments that provide students with the time, space, and resources needed for learning science.
These are teaching standards, not content standards. You don't need to include these in your LPs. RI Middle School GSEs Earth and Space Science
ESS2: The earth is part of a solar system, made up of distinctive parts that have temporal and spatial interrelationships.
8- Systems and Energy/ Patterns of Change
Explain temporal or positional relationships between or among the Earth, sun, moon (e.g. night/day, seasons, year, tides) or how gravitational force affects objects in the solar system (e.g. moons, tides, orbits, satellites).
Students demonstrate an understanding of temporal or positional relationships between or among the Earth, sun, and moon by:
a) Using models to describe the relative motion/ position of the Earth, sun and moon.
Standard 5 Scientific Thinking: The student demonstrates scientific inquiry and problem solving by using thoughtful questioning and reasoning strategies, common sense and conceptual understanding, and appropriate methods to investigate the natural world.
S5a: Frames questions to distinguish cause and effect; and identifies or controls variables in experimental and non-experimental research settings.
S5f: Works individually and in teams to collect and share information and ideas.
Context for the Lesson:
The purpose of this lesson is to utilize the knowledge that is fresh in the students' minds, from the previous class and from the homework assignment, in a lab. After reviewing the homework assignment in front of the whole class, answering questions, clearing confusion, and building confidence, the class will then be introduced to the "sundial" lab. Students will be familiar with the concept since they were introduced to it in the previous class and had a worksheet for homework that went into detail on its structure, and purpose. To build the students' confidence more, I will ask various questions on how we should go about constructing a sundial. The answers to some of these questions will compose our procedure for the experiment. Other questions will hopefully lead to an increase in interest and motivation, while providing some activation of prior knowledge, and introduction to new material. The major goal of the lesson will be to get the students to understand the Sun's individual role with time measurement, how it interacts with the Earth through the seasons of the year, and what evidence there is for these phenomena to be observed on Earth.
I'm not sure that you need to include these questions in the context section. All that is necessary is an overview of the purpose and activities of the lesson.
Questions will include:
What is the most important variable we need for the sundial to work?
Do we have this essential resource?
What were some ancient civilizations that you read about that used sundials?
Where would a good spot be to place/ build our sundial?
What do we need to build it?
Once it is built...how does it work?
Does the time of day matter when it is built? Why?
Where does the sun rise? Set? Does this matter?
What are the limitations of a sundial?
What does the angle of the sun's rays have to do with the effectiveness of the sundial in measuring time?
Does the angle of the sun's rays have anything to do with our seasons? How? What proof do we have?
Could we expect the shadow made by the sundial to be in the same position and in the same spot at 10:00 AM on consecutive sunny days? Why?
When could we expect to see a difference in the shadow, when looking at it at the same time every day?
What are the components of a sundial? Name the parts?
Once we have established the organization and the purpose of our experiment, the class will break up into 3-4 teams and will construct a sundial outside (weather permitting). A handout will be provided that will provide a blueprint of what a sundial's time-measuring-shadows will look like. To ensure that it is not simply copied, I will tell them that the blueprint is from a different part of the world where the sun produces a different shadow and that I will know if the directions were not followed. When the lab is completed, we will meet back in the classroom and make a list of hypotheses about what we think will happen to the shadows of the sundials after a certain amount of time passes. Since this class will meet a period later or earlier the following day, the class will have the opportunity to visit their sundials and record an observation at a different time. Or, depending upon the schedule, students may have the opportunity to record two more observations throughout the day, especially if the sundial is finished with construction by the first class at 9:30 AM. The third period class may have to record an observation or two the following day at an earlier time.
This exercise will build upon their foundation for this unit. They will be asked to think about other ways besides using the sun, that people can measure time. The next lesson will explore those ideas.
Is it worth making a distinction between measuring time intervals and measuring time of day?
Opportunities to Learn:
By engaging in another hands on activity, the students are moving around, conversing with each other, learning, and at the same time having fun. There are multiple ways that students can become engaged in this exercise. Using the theory of multiple intelligences again, we see that interpersonal, linguistic, logical, bodily, and spatial are utilized, allowing students to become engaged in an aspect that suits their own interests. By asking questions prior to the lab, I will hopefully trigger previous knowledge from yesterday's lesson. This will also get the students ready to tackle a problem. Using visual aids, and providing a procedure that is basically produced from the students' responses through guided instruction gives the students a sense of power or responsibility in determining their project. In effect, they will hopefully be teaching themselves. Through this lab, the students will see firsthand the properties of the sun and how it's changing light can be used to measure time. By requiring every student to record their own observations, they are forced to participate.
The depth of knowledge involved in this activity involves all 3 levels. The identification of vocabulary, and the essential parts of the sundial and it's essential resource are level 1. Level 2 requires the students to answer questions relating to how to construct the sundial, why it will or will not work, and how to accomplish the construction of a successful sundial. Level 3 involves discussing hypotheses about what results to expect when the sun moves across the sky. This depth of knowledge encompasses critical thinking and problem solving skills.
To accommodate the different learning styles of students, a teachers aid would provide some help with behavioral issues. Regarding learning disabilities, I would provide some extra attention to those students by visiting their group more often and asking questions to those students to ensure they are not disengaging. Also, if I know that these students like performing certain tasks (building, coloring, going outside), I would try to place them in the best position that allows them to participate more in the group. The more engagement by a student, the more likely they are to retain information. Group assignments will allow different groups to construct their sundial in different areas, thus providing differing results. When presenting the information, the entire class can see results from different groups and compare. The makeup of groups will not be a factor since all members of a group will be required to record their own results and provide a summary of their results and their significance.
The success of this lesson depends upon:
The students being prepared, by having completed their worksheet from the night before.
Active engagement in the discussion and preparation of the sundial lab.
Organization and cooperation during the lab.
A sunny day.
To construct a sundial we need:
Cardboard paper towel rolls (4)
Duct Tape
Cardboard 2ftx2ft (4)
A compass
Sunny day
Paper to record sundial results/ shadows
Blueprint paper of what a sundial and results would look like.
You've obviously given this lesson a lot of thought.
Objectives:
Note that these are supposed to be statements about what the students will be able to do at the end of the lesson. #2 is well-worded, but #1 and #3 are too ambiguous. #7 seems to be a direction for the teacher.
Hone the ability to construct an accurate time measuring sundial. To do this we will first review homework and build knowledge for successful completion of sundial lab. This will activate the prior knowledge from the previous lesson(s), and provide some important information that is essential for the understanding of the lab, such as: understanding the components of a sundial, the necessary orientation (north) that the sundial must be aligned to, the properties of the sun (rises in east, sets in west; and angles of light), the limitations of the time measuring ability of a sundial (only works during daylight hours), historical application and use (10-15 minutes).
Cooperatively construct a sundial with group members that will effectively measure time, and record the first data point on an accurately drawn picture (25-35 minutes).
Effectively work together with group members, through collaboration techniques (recorder, observer, time keeper, organizer).
Each group member will be responsible for developing their own figure describing and representing the sundial and its results. This will force the students to actively engage themselves in the activity rather than observe other students preforming all of the work. This also allows every student to be assessed individually.
Elicit understanding of the lab: any questions or confusion, what was discovered, what can be expected, what can be done better, the significance of it, and when the next measurement will be made. (5-10 minutes)
Present goals for the next class (homework, reading the sundial, what to bring to class)
Opening (10-15% of lesson):
By asking questions that regard the material in the homework, I am attempting to pre-assess the students' knowledge of the topic before jumping into a new lesson. It is important to lead informed, confident, prepared and interested students into a new lesson. This will also allow me to make a judgment on how much more information I need to revisit to get students up to speed to met the goals of the lesson.
Questions that review previous material will eventually lead into questions that relate to today's lesson. Further questions will incorporate the knowledge into its larger significance in science, history, and society. Various questions are listed in the "Context section"
Students would first be asked to take out their homework. We would then discuss any questions or confusions about the homework. The discussion will then be led by questions by myself, while walking around the classroom, and by calling on different students, and repeating questions at different times for different students. Use of the overhead projector connected through a computer or ELMO would have more visual aids (sunrise, sunset, photos showing sun angles, ancient sundials, obelisks, ancient civilizations, etc). After: 1) asking questions that relate to the sundial, 2) asking questions regarding the sun's angled rays and the relationship to Earth's seasons, and 3)having confidence in the students' preparedness to continue, I would then hand out the diagram of what a sundial would look like with a shadow observed at a random time of the day.
It is better to be concrete as you can. What questions will you ask? The questions should be about the homework but also engage your students in the day's investigation. This should not be difficult since the reading included the sundial plans.
Engagement (60-70% of lesson):
To be prepared for the sundial lab we would need the following materials:
Cardboard paper towel rolls (4)
Duct Tape
Cardboard 2ftx2ft (4)
A compass
Sunny day
Paper to record sundial results/ shadows
Blueprint paper of what a sundial and results would look like.
Once we leave the classroom, determine our groups of 4-5 students, and pick our spots to make our sundial, I would start asking the students questions like: You should probably go over the lab with your students before you go outside. You will only have 4 groups of 4-5 students?
Where do we need to orientate our sundial? North? South? East? West?
How can we tell where this direction is without using our compass?
I would then build one of the sundials while giving instructions, so that everyone was constructing at the same time, and on the same step. The steps include: Good.
Duct tape the paper towel roll to the center of the piece of cardboard.
Place the cardboard on the ground with the paper towel roll standing straight up from the cardboard.
Use the compass to find north and place the cardboard square to that direction.
Next, mark the corners of the cardboard on the ground in case it moves, and so that it can be easily placed back in the same spot later on.
Record the position of the shadow on an accurate hand drawn diagram of the sundial.
Record the time of the day and the compass directions (N,S,E,W) on the figure.
Write today's date and the observations. Also, "Write down where you expect the shadow to be two hours from now, and two hours earlier."
To make sure that every sundial is facing north, How will you check this? I would have to visit all of the groups and monitor their method for using the compass correctly. I would also make myself available for questioning, and remind the students that they are all responsible for handing in their own picture/ paper. Once all sundials were completed, and all students had recorded their results, we would take our sundials inside, and begin discussion on what we just accomplished.
Closure (20-25% of lesson):
Once back in the classroom, I would ask the students about the lab:
Will students have time in class to write down their answers, diagram, etc?
What results did you get?
Where was the shadow?
Was it short? Long?
Was it close to the roll? Far?
Is there a correlation between length of shadow and time of day?
Wat can you conclude about the angle of the Sun's rays and the shadow it makes?
I would then collect the assignment, once the discussion emphasized the major areas of the lesson.
Before class ends, I would like to spend at least 5 minutes preparing the students for the next topics. To do this I would ask more questions.
What other ways could we measure time?
Lead discussion towards the moon and stars. How could we measure time for longer periods? How will you get students to think about this question historically? They don't use the moon for much timekeeping.
How could we for instance make a calendar?
Why are there 12 months in our calendar?
A new worksheet will then be handed out on the evolution of the calendar. This will be used to begin the next lesson, and connect the information from the first two lessons to the next lessons. Now that the Sun's role in measuring time has been covered, it is a good time to segue into the other ways that light plays a role in determining time, and on differing time scales. The reading and the worksheet are given for homework. How will you set up the reading assignments? The first page deals with the direction of the sun's rays and the second deals with safe sun exposure. What do you want students to take away from the reading? What will they do as they read?
Assessment:
The collection of the worksheet that was due for homework the previous night will provide a summative assessment of yesterday's lesson. Actually, this worksheet just assesses the assigned reading. To provide feedback and a reference source that would be valuable for the students, I would plan on returning the worksheets by the next lesson. Also, the sundial paper they handed in today (summative and formative) will be assessed for required components (accurate sundial drawing, drawing of shadow, orientation, date and time of day, and observations). I will be able to formatively assess this article due to the paper being used multiple times to record observations, allowing me to witness progress. It can be given a grade as well, as a summative assessment. The answering of questions throughout the day also provided me with a formative assessment of the students through the entire lesson. I was able to judge how much information the students retained from the previous day, and how much preparation they would need for this day's learning goals. It is a way to gauge the prior knowledge, the current knowledge, how much extra help they could need, and how to predict how far the class could progress this lesson.
Title: Sun Properties/ Sundial Lab
GLEs/GSEs:
National Science Education Standards- Teachers of science plan an inquiry-based science program for their students.
- Teachers of science guide and facilitate learning.
- Teachers of science engage in ongoing assessment of their teaching and of student learning.
- Teachers of science design and manage learning environments that provide students with the time, space, and resources needed for learning science.
These are teaching standards, not content standards. You don't need to include these in your LPs.RI Middle School GSEs Earth and Space Science
ESS2: The earth is part of a solar system, made up of distinctive parts that have temporal and spatial interrelationships.
8- Systems and Energy/ Patterns of Change
Explain temporal or positional relationships between or among the Earth, sun, moon (e.g. night/day, seasons, year, tides) or how gravitational force affects objects in the solar system (e.g. moons, tides, orbits, satellites).
Students demonstrate an understanding of temporal or positional relationships between or among the Earth, sun, and moon by:
a) Using models to describe the relative motion/ position of the Earth, sun and moon.
Standard 5 Scientific Thinking: The student demonstrates scientific inquiry and problem solving by using thoughtful questioning and reasoning strategies, common sense and conceptual understanding, and appropriate methods to investigate the natural world.
S5a: Frames questions to distinguish cause and effect; and identifies or controls variables in experimental and non-experimental research settings.
S5f: Works individually and in teams to collect and share information and ideas.
Context for the Lesson:
The purpose of this lesson is to utilize the knowledge that is fresh in the students' minds, from the previous class and from the homework assignment, in a lab. After reviewing the homework assignment in front of the whole class, answering questions, clearing confusion, and building confidence, the class will then be introduced to the "sundial" lab. Students will be familiar with the concept since they were introduced to it in the previous class and had a worksheet for homework that went into detail on its structure, and purpose. To build the students' confidence more, I will ask various questions on how we should go about constructing a sundial. The answers to some of these questions will compose our procedure for the experiment. Other questions will hopefully lead to an increase in interest and motivation, while providing some activation of prior knowledge, and introduction to new material. The major goal of the lesson will be to get the students to understand the Sun's individual role with time measurement, how it interacts with the Earth through the seasons of the year, and what evidence there is for these phenomena to be observed on Earth.I'm not sure that you need to include these questions in the context section. All that is necessary is an overview of the purpose and activities of the lesson.
Questions will include:
- What is the most important variable we need for the sundial to work?
- Do we have this essential resource?
- What were some ancient civilizations that you read about that used sundials?
- Where would a good spot be to place/ build our sundial?
- What do we need to build it?
- Once it is built...how does it work?
- Does the time of day matter when it is built? Why?
- Where does the sun rise? Set? Does this matter?
- What are the limitations of a sundial?
- What does the angle of the sun's rays have to do with the effectiveness of the sundial in measuring time?
- Does the angle of the sun's rays have anything to do with our seasons? How? What proof do we have?
- Could we expect the shadow made by the sundial to be in the same position and in the same spot at 10:00 AM on consecutive sunny days? Why?
- When could we expect to see a difference in the shadow, when looking at it at the same time every day?
- What are the components of a sundial? Name the parts?
Once we have established the organization and the purpose of our experiment, the class will break up into 3-4 teams and will construct a sundial outside (weather permitting). A handout will be provided that will provide a blueprint of what a sundial's time-measuring-shadows will look like. To ensure that it is not simply copied, I will tell them that the blueprint is from a different part of the world where the sun produces a different shadow and that I will know if the directions were not followed. When the lab is completed, we will meet back in the classroom and make a list of hypotheses about what we think will happen to the shadows of the sundials after a certain amount of time passes. Since this class will meet a period later or earlier the following day, the class will have the opportunity to visit their sundials and record an observation at a different time. Or, depending upon the schedule, students may have the opportunity to record two more observations throughout the day, especially if the sundial is finished with construction by the first class at 9:30 AM. The third period class may have to record an observation or two the following day at an earlier time.This exercise will build upon their foundation for this unit. They will be asked to think about other ways besides using the sun, that people can measure time. The next lesson will explore those ideas.
Is it worth making a distinction between measuring time intervals and measuring time of day?
Opportunities to Learn:
By engaging in another hands on activity, the students are moving around, conversing with each other, learning, and at the same time having fun. There are multiple ways that students can become engaged in this exercise. Using the theory of multiple intelligences again, we see that interpersonal, linguistic, logical, bodily, and spatial are utilized, allowing students to become engaged in an aspect that suits their own interests. By asking questions prior to the lab, I will hopefully trigger previous knowledge from yesterday's lesson. This will also get the students ready to tackle a problem. Using visual aids, and providing a procedure that is basically produced from the students' responses through guided instruction gives the students a sense of power or responsibility in determining their project. In effect, they will hopefully be teaching themselves. Through this lab, the students will see firsthand the properties of the sun and how it's changing light can be used to measure time. By requiring every student to record their own observations, they are forced to participate.The depth of knowledge involved in this activity involves all 3 levels. The identification of vocabulary, and the essential parts of the sundial and it's essential resource are level 1. Level 2 requires the students to answer questions relating to how to construct the sundial, why it will or will not work, and how to accomplish the construction of a successful sundial. Level 3 involves discussing hypotheses about what results to expect when the sun moves across the sky. This depth of knowledge encompasses critical thinking and problem solving skills.
To accommodate the different learning styles of students, a teachers aid would provide some help with behavioral issues. Regarding learning disabilities, I would provide some extra attention to those students by visiting their group more often and asking questions to those students to ensure they are not disengaging. Also, if I know that these students like performing certain tasks (building, coloring, going outside), I would try to place them in the best position that allows them to participate more in the group. The more engagement by a student, the more likely they are to retain information. Group assignments will allow different groups to construct their sundial in different areas, thus providing differing results. When presenting the information, the entire class can see results from different groups and compare. The makeup of groups will not be a factor since all members of a group will be required to record their own results and provide a summary of their results and their significance.
The success of this lesson depends upon:
- The students being prepared, by having completed their worksheet from the night before.
- Active engagement in the discussion and preparation of the sundial lab.
- Organization and cooperation during the lab.
- A sunny day.
To construct a sundial we need:- Cardboard paper towel rolls (4)
- Duct Tape
- Cardboard 2ftx2ft (4)
- A compass
- Sunny day
- Paper to record sundial results/ shadows
- Blueprint paper of what a sundial and results would look like.
The text materials to be provided are:Text #1
Text #2
You've obviously given this lesson a lot of thought.
Objectives:
Note that these are supposed to be statements about what the students will be able to do at the end of the lesson. #2 is well-worded, but #1 and #3 are too ambiguous. #7 seems to be a direction for the teacher.Opening (10-15% of lesson):
By asking questions that regard the material in the homework, I am attempting to pre-assess the students' knowledge of the topic before jumping into a new lesson. It is important to lead informed, confident, prepared and interested students into a new lesson. This will also allow me to make a judgment on how much more information I need to revisit to get students up to speed to met the goals of the lesson.Questions that review previous material will eventually lead into questions that relate to today's lesson. Further questions will incorporate the knowledge into its larger significance in science, history, and society. Various questions are listed in the "Context section"
Students would first be asked to take out their homework. We would then discuss any questions or confusions about the homework. The discussion will then be led by questions by myself, while walking around the classroom, and by calling on different students, and repeating questions at different times for different students. Use of the overhead projector connected through a computer or ELMO would have more visual aids (sunrise, sunset, photos showing sun angles, ancient sundials, obelisks, ancient civilizations, etc). After: 1) asking questions that relate to the sundial, 2) asking questions regarding the sun's angled rays and the relationship to Earth's seasons, and 3)having confidence in the students' preparedness to continue, I would then hand out the diagram of what a sundial would look like with a shadow observed at a random time of the day.
It is better to be concrete as you can. What questions will you ask? The questions should be about the homework but also engage your students in the day's investigation. This should not be difficult since the reading included the sundial plans.
Engagement (60-70% of lesson):
To be prepared for the sundial lab we would need the following materials:Once we leave the classroom, determine our groups of 4-5 students, and pick our spots to make our sundial, I would start asking the students questions like:
You should probably go over the lab with your students before you go outside.
You will only have 4 groups of 4-5 students?
- Where do we need to orientate our sundial? North? South? East? West?
- How can we tell where this direction is without using our compass?
I would then build one of the sundials while giving instructions, so that everyone was constructing at the same time, and on the same step. The steps include: Good.- Duct tape the paper towel roll to the center of the piece of cardboard.
- Place the cardboard on the ground with the paper towel roll standing straight up from the cardboard.
- Use the compass to find north and place the cardboard square to that direction.
- Next, mark the corners of the cardboard on the ground in case it moves, and so that it can be easily placed back in the same spot later on.
- Record the position of the shadow on an accurate hand drawn diagram of the sundial.
- Record the time of the day and the compass directions (N,S,E,W) on the figure.
- Write today's date and the observations. Also, "Write down where you expect the shadow to be two hours from now, and two hours earlier."
To make sure that every sundial is facing north, How will you check this? I would have to visit all of the groups and monitor their method for using the compass correctly. I would also make myself available for questioning, and remind the students that they are all responsible for handing in their own picture/ paper. Once all sundials were completed, and all students had recorded their results, we would take our sundials inside, and begin discussion on what we just accomplished.Closure (20-25% of lesson):
Once back in the classroom, I would ask the students about the lab:Will students have time in class to write down their answers, diagram, etc?
- What results did you get?
- Where was the shadow?
- Was it short? Long?
- Was it close to the roll? Far?
- Is there a correlation between length of shadow and time of day?
- Wat can you conclude about the angle of the Sun's rays and the shadow it makes?
I would then collect the assignment, once the discussion emphasized the major areas of the lesson.Before class ends, I would like to spend at least 5 minutes preparing the students for the next topics. To do this I would ask more questions.
- What other ways could we measure time?
- Lead discussion towards the moon and stars. How could we measure time for longer periods? How will you get students to think about this question historically? They don't use the moon for much timekeeping.
- How could we for instance make a calendar?
- Why are there 12 months in our calendar?
A new worksheet will then be handed out on the evolution of the calendar. This will be used to begin the next lesson, and connect the information from the first two lessons to the next lessons. Now that the Sun's role in measuring time has been covered, it is a good time to segue into the other ways that light plays a role in determining time, and on differing time scales. The reading and the worksheet are given for homework. How will you set up the reading assignments? The first page deals with the direction of the sun's rays and the second deals with safe sun exposure. What do you want students to take away from the reading? What will they do as they read?Assessment:
The collection of the worksheet that was due for homework the previous night will provide a summative assessment of yesterday's lesson. Actually, this worksheet just assesses the assigned reading. To provide feedback and a reference source that would be valuable for the students, I would plan on returning the worksheets by the next lesson. Also, the sundial paper they handed in today (summative and formative) will be assessed for required components (accurate sundial drawing, drawing of shadow, orientation, date and time of day, and observations). I will be able to formatively assess this article due to the paper being used multiple times to record observations, allowing me to witness progress. It can be given a grade as well, as a summative assessment. The answering of questions throughout the day also provided me with a formative assessment of the students through the entire lesson. I was able to judge how much information the students retained from the previous day, and how much preparation they would need for this day's learning goals. It is a way to gauge the prior knowledge, the current knowledge, how much extra help they could need, and how to predict how far the class could progress this lesson.